Chapter 18 Hell and Walls

Although confident in his skill to keep the toxin from the students he made them disappear into the stores in the back to be kept from them until year seven herbology and potions, the only reason he considered showing them was to show the extremes of good and bad herbs and to reinforce the fourth rule.

Due to his old age, his speech was slower and filled with slight gasps for air, meaning the material that they covered that day was limited to the rules, the two herbs, and basic cauldron use.

And with 10 short minutes, Zhāng ran to the east side of the campus which was the quickest way to get to the training fields for the dueling class. With one minute to spare, Zhāng made his way onto the tiled platform filled with 99 students– unlike the other classes where there was only one other person with a dragon inscription every single one of the students had that.

Seeing that the last student appeared the teacher began even though there was still time in between classes.

"Welcome to your new personal hell, I am your instructor Shiro. here you will learn to not only protect yourself but gain the understanding to make the attacker never want to fight you again, this is an important skill that is being forgotten by even the greats such as Britain, America, and India, however, here in china you will not pass if you don't pass every dueling class".

"For the next three months you will learn nothing, you will run two laps around those red flags, you will do 15 suicides from one end to the next as fast as possible, 50 push-ups, 50 situps, 50 Burpees" after he was done speaking he sat down and grabbed a cup of coffee and a book and began reading "Ohh, and all of you have to wear those" he reminded himself pointing to their feet which a bracelet magically appeared.

After a second of silence the teacher looked up and in confusion asked "What do you all need permission? Grab the bracelet and start running", quickly everyone grabbed the bracelet and began to run in confusion; Zhāng, however, quickly ran to a tree on the outside and changed into a more appropriate outfit to run in the heat, being a pair of shorts and non-magic Nike shoes and a short-sleeved shirt.

Even though everyone gave him weird looks, they quickly understood the intelligence behind the change of clothes. With the heat and greater maneuverability, Zhāng lasted way longer even though he was only slightly more athletic than they were.

40 minutes later the four miles were run leaving the basic work and suicides, having already run four miles Zhāng stopped running and made his way to the tiled platform getting into position for a push up, he stopped instantly due to the heat of the tile, looking around he went back to the shaded tree instantly drawing the attention of the almost dying students sill on the beginnings of the third lap.

In another 40 minutes, Zhāng was laying on the ground looking up at the tree wanting to die, however after a five-minute break he made his way to the tiled platform to do the suicides hopefully finishing in the next 10 to 15 minutes.

Finishing just barely before the teacher called everyone to the original spot where they met, Zhāng was the only person that brought water so while everyone else had a constant painful throbbing head, Zhāng although very sore and tired wasn't in any physical pain. Another upside to the clothes that Zhāng wore was the smell, everyone reaked even though they all wore non-magic deodorant but nobody including Zhāng really cared.

"So what did you all learn?" He condescendingly asked "Hmm nothing, not to bring lighter and more maneuverable clothing? What about water? With all of you being nobles I highly doubt that you couldn't get lighter non-magic clothing, so don't use that excuse".

"You all are dismissed, I will see you in two days, and I hope that you learn from this prepared gentleman" He ended while nodding to Zhāng.

The walk across the campus was a special kind of miserable with almost every upper-class student giving a knowing smile or a giggle to the sight of what they also once had to indure. Once he finally reached the small villa that he was given, within he simply rested in the living room.

Once the sun went down and Zhāng gained some semblance of control over his sore and aching body he began his homework, starting with history he began his essay on the five cities to first gain walls.

The first clearly marked city for the non-magics to gain walls was a Chinese administrative capital called Ao, with around 3.4 sq km of space inside the walled section; it was very small compared to similarly dated European cities with walls. Zhengzhou, Anyang, Shang along with Ao, and Panlongcheng were the first cities to gain walls taking hundreds of thousands of people over many years.